Feasibility study on recovery from humeral fractures in older adults
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Proximal Humeral Fractures and Frailty: A Feasibility Study to Assess Frailty in the Recovery of Patients aged 65 and Over with a Nested Qualitative Study.
IRAS ID
336295
Contact name
Sarah Midgley
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University Hospitals of Derby and Burton NHS Foundation Trust
Duration of Study in the UK
2 years, 0 months, 31 days
Research summary
The aim of this study is for us to understand whether older adults (65 and over) with a fracture at the top of their arm (proximal humeral fracture or PHF) become measurably more frail in the year after the injury.
Previous studies have shown that these patients may have to move into residential care and that there is an increased rate of death in the year following the injury. However, these studies are retrospective and did not collect much information from the patients at the time of their injury. Our study will follow up to 50 patients from the time of their injury to a year after. At the time of recruitment, and then 6 and 12 months after the injury we will collect information on the activities participants are able to do, where they are living and whether they need help to perform activities of daily living. This will allow us to measure frailty at the different time points. We will also collect information on how well they are able to use the arm they injured. A subgroup of patients will be interviewed at the end of the study to ask them about their experiences of participating in the study and what was important to them during their recovery from the injury.
This study is a feasibility study, which means that we will not recruit enough patients to give us a definitive answer to our research question. We want to know whether the study design is acceptable to patients and how many patients we would need to recruit to get a definitive answer about changes in frailty.
If we demonstrate that patients with PHF become more frail in the year following injury the ultimate aim will be to develop better treatments for these patients to help them maintain their independence.REC name
Yorkshire & The Humber - South Yorkshire Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
24/YH/0123
Date of REC Opinion
4 Jul 2024
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion